


Some things are worth the risk (others, not so much)

by Velace



Series: Random Moments [42]
Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: F/F, Fluff and Humor, Mild Language
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-09
Updated: 2018-01-09
Packaged: 2019-03-02 22:03:53
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,655
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13327290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Velace/pseuds/Velace
Summary: Season 1 Emma (with fourish years of actual development and a hard, hard lady boner for Regina) meets the Evil Queen.





	Some things are worth the risk (others, not so much)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [evergrove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/evergrove/gifts).



> I let the muse take over while I worked through writer's block and posted this on tumblr. Evergrove asked for it here, and I like their praise enough to oblige.

“You!”

“Oh shit.”

Turning from the bookshelf she tried to hurriedly search through, Emma came face to face with the Evil Queen. “I would know that stink anywhere.”

She frowned. Stink? She didn’t stink. What the hell? “Huh?”

“Oh, Princess Leia,” the Queen purred, “how I have longed for your return. Guards!”

“Hey, wait a minute!” The doors burst open but before any of the three guards could reach her, Emma waved a hand through the air and froze them all. She didn’t come here to be imprisoned by this psycho again. “Chill your tits, woman.”

“I beg your pa-” The Queen’s head whipped around as she noted none of her guards had reached them yet. Attention returning to Emma, she frowned. “What did you do?”

Emma shrugged. “Magic. Obviously.”

“How dare you.”

Going back to her search, she said, “You know, people would like you more if your immediate response to anything you don’t understand wasn’t to lock it up or kill it.”

A growl that would honestly have made her wet herself just a year ago sounded behind her, making her smile. “I ought to-”

“Yeah, yeah,” she interjected, more than familiar with that tone. “Let’s skip the threats and the general unpleasantness you hide behind to disguise the fact your sole want in life is the love of a good person who’ll bend you over the nearest surface for a nice, hard fracking, and go our separate ways, yeah? I’m not going back to your dungeon, and you can’t make me, so go torment some other peasant.”

Another growl, much closer than the first, settled in her stomach. “I can’t make you?”

Peering back over a shoulder, she smirked. The Queen _was_ a lot closer than she had been. Emma fluttered her lashes innocently and teased, “I’m surprised you even heard any of that underneath all that hair.”

Lip curling as she raised her hand, the Queen snarled, “I have had enough of you.”

Familiar magic wrapped around her but Emma knew it wasn’t in the way the Queen intended. There was no pain and no crushing desire to scream and beg for her life. It was warm, comforting- like when Regina surprise hugged her before she regained sense and acted like affection was the worst possible thing in the world.

Turning around fully, she cocked a brow. “Did I not just say you can’t make me? You really should pay attention.”

The Queen frowned. “Why did that not work?”

“I’m immune to magic?”

“Impossible.”

While true, she figured a lie was better than the truth. She couldn’t interfere any more than she already was, and telling the Queen her magic didn’t work on her because her future self cast a spell to protect the woman she loved probably wouldn’t go down all that well; she was here to find something for Regina, not change the future. “You can believe that if you want. It’ll make it easier to convince you this was a dream when I leave.”

“A dream?”

“Sure, why not?” Again, she shrugged. “Really, who would talk to you the way I have been in reality? You’re terrifying- the big, bad Evil Queen; all out with their hearts and on with the flames. Scary. Totally.” She paused on seeing how pale the Queen was getting. “You should sit down.”

“You’re not afraid of me.”

Watching the realization sink in, she waited until the Queen sat before she replied. “Not in the slightest.” She grinned, all (as Regina often said) lopsided and dopey. “Don’t be too disappointed though; the only person I’m afraid of anymore is my wife.”

 

The Queen tilted her head and repeated, “Wife?”

“Uh huh.” Knowing the book wasn’t in the shelf behind her, Emma grimaced and moved on to the next as she resumed her search. Next time Regina sent her there for whatever reason, she was going to drag her with her, kicking and screaming if need be. “Damn baby brained woman.”

“What are you doing?”

“Trying to find a book,” she answered distractedly, perusing the spines. She sighed after a moment, just about ready to give up. “She said it was here, but she’s not big on details.”

“You risked your life to come here and steal a book from me?”

It wasn’t _technically_ stealing, but yeah; that was the gist of it. “She wants a kid,” Emma explained. “Figured, why not?” The lengths she was prepared to go to for her wife to be happy wasn’t going to be limited by a silly little thing like potential suicide.

“You have magic…”

“Uh huh.”

“And a wife…”

“Yep.”

“You’re going to get her pregnant?”

“Can’t. Mother was fucking nuts, so she drank a potion. I’ll be the pregnant one.” Realizing what she said too late, she winced and quickly changed the subject. Kind of. “Honestly, not looking forward to it as much as she is. Our son’s head was gigantic.”

“H-how?”

“Long story.” Four years worth, and counting. “I mean really long story. You’d need a free week, at least, to catch up. My life is ridiculous.”

The Queen sighed. “Leia-”

“Emma,” she corrected without thinking.

“Pardon?”

“My name; it’s Emma.” In for a penny, in for a pound. “I lied when we last met,” she continued, hoping she remembered the ingredients for that forgetting potion Regina mentioned before she left. “For good reason- don’t ask.”

“Are you even a Princess?”

“Ugh,” she groaned. “I wish I could say no, but yeah, I am.”

“Oh.”

Looking over her shoulder and seeing the look of disappointment on the Queen’s face, she chuckled. “Don’t feel like you have to treat me differently,” she said. “Happy to be a peasant in your eyes, your Majesty.”

Meeting her gaze, the Queen quirked a brow. “Rather odd thing for a Princess to say.”

“From what I’ve experienced first hand, most royalty are stuck up, self-righteous do nothings…” She paused, clearing her throat before adding, “No offense. Peasants do all the hard work, and the royals swoop in to take all the credit… I’d rather be known for being useful, than for whose vagina I shot out of.”

 

“Interesting perspective.”

Emma grinned. “I’m an interesting person.”

“You would have to be.” Amused but knowing, Emma knew that tone and she sighed. The Queen let the weight of the realization settle between them before she questioned, “Tell me, Princess _Em-ma_ ; how long have we been married?”

It was naive to think she wouldn’t put all the pieces together. Still, Emma had held out _some_ hope she hadn’t given too much away. She warned Regina this whole thing was a terrible idea, but did she listen to her? No, of course not. When Regina decided something, you either capitulated and went through with whatever she wanted you to do immediately, or she made you wish you had before you eventually gave in and did it anyway.

Emma thought if she chose the less difficult route for once, the powers that be might grant her _some_ leeway, but apparently not.

Head tipping forward, she banged it gently against a few books and silently cursed her sinfully attractive and convincing wife. “Almost eight months,” she answered, seeing no other choice.

If she ignored the Queen, chances are the woman would grow impatient, give in to one of her inevitable mood swings and Emma would be right back to dodging threats of maiming and death. Or worse, she’d have to tolerate the sensation of the Queen _trying_ to maim and kill her with magic, persistently, until she found the book, drugged her future wife, and escaped.

Immediate capitulation really was the best decision all around.

“How are you here?”

Taking a deep breath, she slowly turned around and leaned back against the shelf. “Despite what you were told, time travel isn’t impossible. We were attacked a while ago by someone who knew how. We stopped her but, unfortunately, she had already opened her portal, which is how I ended up here last time. You are-” She smiled, recalling how excited Regina had been when she told her. “-insanely intelligent. You figured out a way to replicate the spell without certain undesirable steps and now…”

She spread her arms wide and with a shrug, she said, “Voila, here I am.”

 

Humming, the Queen stood. Emma eyed her warily as she moved closer, drawing an amused chuckle before the Queen stopped mere inches from her. “I find myself curious of the woman I become for you to be afraid of her, but not me,” she drawled, eyes slowly raking down her form. “Either I am a monstrous nightmare, or you are-”

“Thoroughly whipped,” Emma interrupted, unashamed as the Queen’s gaze snapped up. She grinned. “I know you were probably going to say weak, or something along those lines but yeah, no; I’m just stupidly in love and pretty much willing to do anything for you.”

“Oh.”

The sudden breathlessness had her grin widening as she pushed from the shelf, confessing, “It’s a lot of pretend terror to stroke her ego, and general marital fear of being punished and not being able to sleep in the same bed…” She shuddered at the next thought and added, “Or spending the rest of my life celibate.”

Talk about a monstrous nightmare.

“Given the reason you’re here,” the Queen murmured, “I don’t imagine that will be a problem.”

Emma chuckled. Probably not, but Regina could be a patient person when she found a good enough reason. It was best not to piss her off if she could help it. “I won’t be risking it, all the same.”

The Queen smirked before she reached for something above and behind Emma. When she brought the arm back down, she held a small, leather-bound book in her hand. “With such good instincts-” she said, pressing the book into Emma’s chest. “-I do believe you shall have a very long, very depraved married life, Princess.”


End file.
